


So Close To Magic

by vexahliaderolo



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Feelings Realization, Fluff, Gen, M/M, probably not canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-10-06 02:32:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17337020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vexahliaderolo/pseuds/vexahliaderolo
Summary: Caleb thinks he doesn't understand Molly and so somehow doesn't understand himself, it's probably not that deep.





	So Close To Magic

**Author's Note:**

> This is pretty much the first fic I have ever written/finished in my life so !!! pls enjoy, i miss one (1) purple boy very much.
> 
> Title is from the song of the same name by Aquilo, it's not particularly relevant lyrics-wise but I liked the fit of the title!

Caleb couldn’t recall the last time he had truly been with someone, in any sense of the phrase.

Of course he had existed around them, touched a shoulder or been pushed aside in a crowd, but he made no lasting connections. He almost managed an inward bound snort as he passed over even bothering to try and recall a romantic spark of any kind, it had been a long life of solitude, at least it had been since leaving them. The simple act of being emotionally present had become foreign to him, to look at someone with more than the wish to know how they could help him get to where he needed to be. Not since being a misled teen had Caleb Widogast looked at another person with something even resembling love.

Now he stood, legs almost shaking, hands dusted with ash and dirt, flanked on either side by withered looking faces and protective stances. The itch of belonging clawed at his chest, an ever constant chant of “Love! Love! Love!” ghosting over every inch of his skin, making him squirm and twist with an eagerness to escape he had not felt in months. Every camp they made held him to the same process; study what you found, plan for how it will help, place himself at a noticeable distance, remain beyond the mental and emotional wall, and fail at every step. It was a constant battle, consistently followed by a more noticeably constant string of losses, and tonight was no different.

Jester edged her way through every crack in his defences with gentle banter and darling eccentricities, blue freckles glittering above a radiant smile. Nott protected his empty shell with tiny goblin hands and a gargantuan heart, yellow eyes fixated on his future, perhaps even more frequently than himself. Beau knew what he had done, knew the horror his hands had wrought and trusted them anyway, regarded him with all the duality of a sister, her gaze a war between her fondness and irritation every moment it met his. In spite of her erratic departures something in Yasha felt constant, her presence when she offered it was a calming ointment to his wounds, the type of cold that comforts. Fjord was something unexpected, a presence that pushed, pulled, and then stopped you altogether; he pressed the buttons Caleb had long forgotten he had and goaded out the recklessness hidden deep in his gut—

A sudden crackle from the fire in front of him had his pondering abruptly cease; the blaze flickered in an angry fit, huffing out embers and ash as it was prodded violently from the opposite side. Fervent flames lit gold and silver metals from below, sending sporadic glimmers across the dull blue of Caleb’s eyes.

Mollymauk.

Mollymauk was different, an enigma he supposed, an existence that was both old and new, every experience tried once and yet still fresh to the senses. If Caleb had ever been asked to place himself and Mollymauk on some kind of personality spectrum, he could have watched the expanse of patterns and purple frolic as far from him as possible. Comfortable and happier for all the distance of their differences between them.

Well, perhaps until this point that is what he had imagined.

It wouldn’t be a happiness born of hatred nor irritation, Caleb knew that much, knew from experience how it felt to pour your heart in to resentment, to let it fester in hostility until you wondered how you had ever had the audacity to use the word hatred before this. No. This wasn’t that. This would have been a happiness born from being far from what confused him, what addled his brain when he woke in the early hours or what kept him from joining the ranks of his snoring teammates as they lined the edges of their camp on warm evenings. No, it wasn’t that he hated Molly, he had thought he might, whatever their relationship had been when they had first met had teetered dangerously along that serrated edge. Regrettably it was more that he, well, he--

His hands grew clammy as they pressed in to each other, knuckles from his left hand kneading the roughened palm of his right, and he let his head droop from the familiar weight of frustration upon it, he had lead himself back into the labyrinth of his latest problem;

And It took less than a minute for his problem to speak.

“Rough day for you, Mister Caleb? Fighting for your life getting you down?” In the ways Yasha’s voice felt like a gentle touch to his mind, or Jester’s laughter somehow managed to sparkle in the air in front of him, Mollymauk’s voice was always a stark contrast. The off kilter velveteen lilt crushed him like a vice, a blinding white light in his pupils, every word an attack that struck true with no ill intention behind it. At least, not always.

Caleb knew his pause was perhaps too prolonged and so he let out a small grunt in noncommittal agreement, giving himself at least another 30 seconds to form a sentence of worth. Although with which words he still did not know.

“I just... I don’t understand.” Oh. Those ones.

At first the only reply the tiefling gave was a raised brow. The next was a lopsided grin, his left cheek dipping in to an absurdly charming dimple and Caleb heard his knuckles crack as he clenched one hand around his other fist. Molly’s words finally came again as he seemed to ponder using one of his swords to stoke the fire, his previous twig burnt to a cinder after his enthusiasm earlier.

“A charming sentiment I don’t often have the pleasure of hearing from you, but it’s quite simple, really.” He lifted the scimitar from his hip as he spoke, Caleb tried not to let his gaze linger too long on that curve, pointing it harmlessly towards the wizard. “They want to kill _you_ and so you kill _them_ first, in the cases where such a thing is appropriate obviou—“

“No, not that. I understand that...” The fire was hot enough, Caleb thought as he paused, almost too hot, the sight of it licking at his feet causing him to feel as though the orange glow was staining. “To an extent at least.”

“Oh. Then, what?” Svelte fingers spun the blade in such nonchalant fashion that it would have made someone unfamiliar with Mollymauk horribly afraid. Alas, Caleb mused, he was in fact rather familiar.

“You.” Ah.

“Me?” There it was.

“ _Ja_ , you. I do not understand a thing about you and so, in course, I don’t understand how that makes me feel about-- About...” His hand gestured wildly at the fountain of extravagance before him, his voice dropping drastically in volume with every second that passed him by.

"About you." Or what I have just started, his mind continued for him.

“I wasn’t aware you felt anything beyond a need to complete your great quest, whatever it may be, and that I was naught but a rather well oiled cog in the machine of your life.” Now that his sword had been sheathed Molly was leaning back on his hands, his position on the large rotting log was precarious and yet he looked nothing less than serene.

Caleb raged at the elegance of it all, how the other could be so composed as this unending hurricane ripped at his insides. His continuously cool demeanour was infuriating. Cool enough to make his verbal jabs as always. Cool enough to not care that Caleb’s plans were in fact falling apart at the seams purely because of him, because Mollymauk Tealeaf had to be an enticing grand design of grace and extravagance, rather than the utter bore Caleb perceived his own outward existence to be.

Standing wordlessly, Caleb began to traipse by the purple devil, huffing under his breath and cursing from his very soul at how childish his actions were, just as a hand caught his arm. The laugh that followed was an immediate douse to the flames burning in his gut, an icy lake surrounding his lone candle. It was perfect, he thought, immediately letting the secret catch on his humble pyre as quickly as it had come. He was yanked unceremoniously on to his buttocks, haphazardly flopped upon the same log as Molly, shocked out of his tantrum long enough to let his resolve to leave wither away in front of the other’s inquisitive scarlet eyes.

“That was perhaps a little harsh, I’m sorry.” Caleb was listening, he was sure, but there was a hand still wrapped cautiously around his wrist and as much as he tried to trick his mind in to believing otherwise, he of course knew it belonged to Mollymauk. “I suppose I just don’t understand what _you_ don’t understand. I especially don’t understand what I could possibly have to do with your feelings, magic-man, since you do seem to be keeping them under such strict supervision. I am rather flattered, and incredibly surprised, that you’ve been thinking of me at all.”

Caleb was busy categorising the moment piece by piece as he wondered if he even knew how to form a response; The tilt of Molly’s head matched to the very last syllable of his sentence, perfectly punctuating the sentiment. Darkly saturated violet hair brushed by his brows, causing his lashes to flutter subconsciously, a familiar occurrence but as delicately winsome every time Caleb caught it. The dimple was present again, this time it flanked a genuine smile, barely there but somehow so staggeringly vibrant Caleb wondered how one could hold so much power in such a small prize.

He would see these details impeccably replicated in his dreams, it was not the first time that he felt his unparalleled memory a curse.

It struck Caleb abruptly and with some emotional velocity that this was a particular brand of Mollymauk he was distantly familiar with. Heard from across tables or along the edges of bars, through the rickety walls and doors of inns, and even on the barely populated roads as they passed the first travellers they had seen in days. He was always removed from the interaction, listening in with Frumpkin or through his own lucky but unintentional positioning. This was... Mollymauk was—

“— Flirting with me?” _Scheiße_.

Caleb had oft wished for the day he would be skilled enough to master a spell he had read tales of throughout his studies, a spell that had the power to let it’s user reach in to the mind of another, to mix and match, pick and choose, archive or delete; the power to gain control over memories.

Gods, how he had wished.

How he still very much wished.

His self deprecating was thankfully interrupted by the most incredible howl of laughter, jarring him from his practically catatonic state of shock just in time for him to watch Mollymauk fall backwards from the log. The sudden upwards swing of his legs accompanied by the soft thump of his back hitting the floor, auburn leaves fluttering up and scattering themselves in to curling purple hair that splayed itself out across the uneven ground left Caleb breathless for what felt like a year. Leaning over to make sure his companion hadn’t broken anything too important, his lips parted and ready to call for their clerically gifted friend, he felt the quiet smack as he shut them again more than he registered the idea to do it. Now Caleb wasn’t a man that said much, in fact he would consider himself rather quiet, introspective even, but it wasn’t often that something forcibly rendered him speechless. The sight below was all of a sudden placing highly on a very short list.

He wasn’t sure if it was the satisfyingly crisp contrast of the autumn hues beneath all of the gloriously jewel tones that were being strewn across them that was so hypnotising, or perhaps it was the way Mollymauk’s chest was rising and falling with such fervent movement as unceremoniously stretched lips tumbled out another laugh. His long fingered hands coming up to push back the hair from his face whilst his eyes closed from the joyful overexertion, a simultaneous exhale pushing his lips in to a new ‘o’ shape that sent a number of freeloading leaves on their way.

It was perhaps the first time that he felt his unparalleled memory a blessing.

“Oh, _Caleb_.” A definite whiff of condescension, but he was still smiling and so Caleb was still unfazed. “How long have we known each other now?” His eyes were open again now, bright and full of spirit, smiling cheeks pushing up in to them from below. It took a number of seconds before Caleb truly registered the question.

“A month, two perhaps.”

“Mhm.” Red eyes turned up towards the sky as lilac hands came down to rest amongst the autumn debris. “Which leads me to wonder if the copious amounts of flirting I have been doing in your direction up until this exact moment were for naught? You break my heart, sir.” 

The playful tone had returned to that familiar prose and with it a new, vexing twinge in Caleb’s chest, his heartbeat tripping over itself as startlingly fast as Molly had fallen over that damned log. Molly took his silence as a cue to continue;

“I suppose I’m not all that surprised you didn’t notice, this is you we’re talking about after all, Caleb.” It was as jarringly electrifying to hear his name as it always was from Mollymauk, soft and tenderly spoken yet intensely pointed all at once.

“Like I said before, I understand a lot of things Mollymauk, I just don’t understand you.” Caleb watched one of Molly’s perfectly sculpted hands as he spoke, seeing it pat the earth at his side he began to shift, edging himself closer towards the ground.

“I think it’s simply flirting you don’t understand.” The tiefling mused.

“And you’re probably right.” Caleb was laying beside him now, a good, suitably comforting inch between their shoulders as he lay perfectly still, eyes fixated on the sky above him. “I haven’t had many chances to practice, you know.”

He thought at that moment that the sky he was admiring was very much like the man beside him, blues and reds smoking through a sweet purple in the evening’s dim light, of course, but more than that is that it was so disarmingly inviting. The widest expanse he’d ever laid his eyes on, filling his gut with an inexplicable fear, full to bursting with both the brightest glitter and the darkest depths all so very far out of his reach, muddied hands flailing in to the void as they always had. He thought that of Molly too, a person full of contradiction in the most fantastical instances, a heart full of space dust and a mind full of gut-wrenching black holes. What that must be like, he thought, to know you are you and have that simply be enough, to not feel even the slightest need to fill in the gaps because whatever you saw in the mirror was all that you wanted. A thought or a feeling Caleb could not comprehend.

As suddenly as the idea had occurred it vanished; Interrupted, as he often was these days, by Mollymauk’s voice cutting through the fog.

“Then let’s simply start again. I’m letting you start over Caleb Widogast, don’t waste it.” He wondered if he or his heart would ever grow accustomed to that blasted optimism.  
“My name’s Mollymauk.” He lifted the hand closest to Caleb, letting it flop softly on to his ash covered chest, gesturing for the Wizard to take it.

“Mollymauk Tealeaf, if you’d like to be a little formal about it.” As always his grin was impish, punctuated at either side with small, sharp fangs and yet he was nothing less than a vision of open amicability. His eyebrows raised as Caleb continued to silently stare, giving another gentle tap of his knuckles to the other man’s chest.

“And... You are?”

‘ _I’m letting you start over Caleb Widogast_ ’ the words rang loudly through Caleb’s head, again and again, ricocheting from every wall in his brain to the next with deafening clarity. It wasn’t what he had planned, not the restart he dreamt of when sleep eventually found him, simply a dim want next to that blazing need still gnawing at every inch of his skin.

But he felt it.

Felt the old unfamiliar swell of his heart as the words started to wind and twist their way around it, melting in to his veins with a sickly sweet scent he knew he would never be rid of now. Finally felt every piece of himself, and of the soul opposite his, that his brain had been trying to unpack on it’s own for weeks now; Felt something inside of him open up to everything Mollymauk had been trying to offer him.

“My name--” he started and stopped, a fear gathering in his stomach like a stone sinking in the ocean, endless and dark. Until it wasn’t. He watched the smile on the face in front of him and he let it go, let the stone crumble, float to surface like it had never been. Feeling his hand move before he could even begin to try and stop it, the hairs on his arms standing to attention when his palm brushed against the smoothness of another.

“My name is Caleb Widogast.”

And I think I finally understand.


End file.
